For those of you that celebrate St. Patrick's Day -- have a good one. Just don't do anything too crazy. Sure, drinking your own weight in green beer sounds like a good idea at first, but when you wake up the next morning lying in a ditch, wearing someone else's clothes, with some unidentifiable substance in your pocket, you might not think it was such a good idea.

Happy Valentine's Day everyone. I know some people think that Valentine's Day was just made up to sell more cards, chocolates, and flowers, but what can I say, I love all Holidays. Any excuse to make a day special, to have a celebration, or just to have some candy, is a good thing in my books.

And besides, Valentine's Day is at least a more meaningful holiday than St. Patrick's Day (unless maybe you're Irish), although I have every intention of celebrating St. Patrick's Day as well. And if anyone else knows of any other good days to celebrate between know and then, feel free to let me know.

So in honour of Valentine's Day, I've added a new poem to the Literature section entitled We Are. Is it a love poem, or is it just some random poem that has nothing to do with Valentine's Day? You'll have to read it and decide for yourself.

OK, so I know it's a little late to be saying Happy New Year, but I haven't had a chance to say it yet, so I'm saying it now. And who says that the year doesn't start on January 16th anyway. January 16th is as good a day as any to start the year, plus it's also the anniversary date for Transcendental Stage, and I'm sure most of you would agree that time didn't really mean anything before Transcendental Stage started.

Hopefully the new year will bring good things for all of you. I have all sorts of things planed for the site in the coming year, and although last year fell a little short in my goals for the site, I really think this year will bring some great things to Transcendental Stage. So keep checking back for all the fun and exciting additions. If you want to be kept up to date on everything that is going on at Transcendental Stage, you should join the newsletter mailing list. I know it hasn't even come close to being the monthly newsletter it was planned to be, but that is all going to change this year. The next newsletter should be coming out this month, and should be followed by another one next month.

And if I somehow fail to make all the regular updates to the site that I have planned, don't worry, I have a backup plan. I'll just embed some sort of hidden message on the site that tells your brains to erase all memories of Transcendental Stage after you leave the site, so that the next you come back everything will seem new. I've always felt people should live their lives based on the motto "If I haven't seen it before, it's new to me", and this would just be my way of helping out. So whatever happens, everyone wins, or possibly everyone loses, I always get those two confused.

I've been so busy in my workshop this month, getting everything ready for my big sleigh ride on the 24th ... oh wait, that's not me. Well, I've been busy doing something this month, which has had the unfortunate side effect of leaving Transcendental Stage a little neglected. The site has lost a lot of weight and is starting to look mangy. It also keeps making this yelping noise every time I say the phrase 'chestnuts roasting on an open fire', but I don't know what that's all about.

OK, none of that made any sense, but the point is, there haven't been many updates this month, and unfortunately, there probably won't be that many more until next year (although there should be at least a couple). But you should all be out enjoying this wonderful time of year anyway. So go out and roll around in the snow (but dress warmly because dying of hypothermia isn't as fun as it sounds, trust me), and if you don't have any snow where you live, then pour a bunch of salt into a mound and roll around in that, it's pretty much the same thing except for the part where you get horribly scratched by all the salt grains, and then end up rubbing salt into your own wounds.

Once you've recovered from your ill advised roll in the 'snow' (which should be sometime around mid 2008), you should come back to the site and there will be all sorts of fun new things to check out.

Halloween is long over, but for those of you that may not have had a chance to see some of the latest Halloween content that was added to the site (which may have been because some of it wasn't added to the site until after Halloween), here are some of the recent additions to the site.

It's a little too early to start talking about any of the big Holidays in December, but if people can have Santa Claus parades in November, then I guess it's OK for me to mention that there will be all sorts of new items added to the shop this month just in time for gift giving, if you're into that sort of thing.

But while you're waiting for all that Holiday cheer to arrive, keep checking the site for many non-holiday related updates this month.

Halloween Month is here again, and as usual, that means some fun Halloween content will be added to the site this month. It's still early, so there will be more coming later, but to start things off, here is the latest Ed Fur's Dream: Never Want to Eat Sardines featuring the return of the ghost.

Fortunately for me, the gremlins that always seem to be impeding my progress on this site, are usually too busy during Halloween month to bother me, so it should be a good month full of updates to the site. A few items that will be coming soon might not all be Halloween themed, which I know seems crazy -- how could anyone think of anything other than Halloween during Halloween month -- but don't worry, by the end of the month there should be plenty of Halloween goodness to keep you satisfied. Or at least hold you over until you have bags of candy goodness to really keep you satisfied.

There are some cool new things coming to Transcendental Stage, but since they are still a little ways off, I won't waste time talking about them now. Why did I bother mentioning it then? That's a very good question. I'm going to leave it up to you to answer the question, but to make it easier, I'll give you a few possible suggestions:

a) The Devil made me do it
b) A man in a large yellow cowboy hat offered me a bucket full of money to include the phrase 'cool new things'
c) I've gone completely crazy and can no longer control what I write
d) I like to pretend that I am actually making progress with the site, and quite frankly, I couldn't think of anything else to say
e) All of the above

Of course, if you don't like any of those answers, feel free to come up with one of your own.

But, enough of that nonsense, the point is, you are going to have to wait a little while for all the cool new stuff, but in the meantime you can check out some of the newest content on the site. Such as a new photography piece called Resa Anblicken. Or a new poem called Relative Despair. And of course there is the latest EFD comic.

Well, I hate to constantly admit my own failure at updating the site as often as I should, but since I've already established a theme of apologizing for my lateness, I might as well stick with the theme. So once again, I'm sorry for not updating more often, and I'll try to do better in the future.

Unfortunately, that future is going to be at least two weeks away because I'm going to be gone for a while. I could tell you where I'm going, but making something up will be much more interesting, so it's probably best that you just assume I'm going on an intergalactic adventure the likes of which have never been seen (which means there will most likely be intense life or death situations, and someone will end up happily ever after, though probably not me)

Hopefully my intergalactic adventure will give me all sorts of inspiration and new material to work with so that I can add many new and exciting additions to the site.

Sure Valentine's Day may have been invented to sell chocolate, flowers, cards, teddy bears, and jewelry, but all Holidays are good days (it's a rule). There may not be ghosts, elves, or leprechauns, but I'm sure you can find something to enjoy about the day *wink* *wink*.

Or you could check out the Poetry section. They aren't necessarily love poems, but poetry is always open to interpretation, so you can believe that they are about romance and love, or death, or drunk wallabies, whatever floats your boat.

Or if you just don't like Valentine's Day, then why not check out Ed Fur's Dreams for a good laugh, or at least some good scratch-your-head attempts at humour.

Due to the all the hectic 'craziness' of the holidays, Transcendental Stage suffered from a somewhat early Holiday break that also went a little longer than expected. So some of the items that were supposed to be added during December are just being added now. But I'm sure you're all thinking, "this is perfect, I was hoping to find some way to stretch the holidays out a little longer." So maybe the delay was all part of my ingenious plan. (Or at least that is what I'm going to tell myself.)

I'm going to try to ignore the fact that it's getting very cold outside, and try to focus on the good -- the Holiday Season has started. Everyone loves the Holiday Season, and when I say 'everyone', I'm excluding those people that don't love the Holiday Season, because those people don't really count, now do they.

So if I can pry myself away from watching all the specials on TV, I'm going to try to add some fun Holiday inspired content to the site this month. And if you can pry yourself away from those same specials, you can come visit Transcendental Stage and check them out.

And for those of you still looking to do some gift shopping, there's still enough time to browse the shop and find some fantastic gifts that everyone will love, and when I say 'everyone', I'm excluding those people that won't love those gifts, because those people don't really count, now do they.

Halloween's over, and probably most of the candy is gone by now. Even the Simpsons Halloween special has aired. So it's time to move on to other things.

I was so busy with all the Halloween themed content I added last month that I have been neglecting some of the other areas of the site, so I hope to correct that over the next couple of months.

I'm also going to be adding a number of new items to the shop that will be available in time for the holidays. Everyone loves a fun T-shirt, and they go great with any gift. A video game, and a fun T-shirt. A movie, and a fun T-shirt. A new car, and a fun T-shirt. Whatever gifts you may be giving this holiday season, you can't go wrong by adding in a fun T-shirt.

But it's not just T-shirts, there are all sorts of items in the shop that would go great with that new waffle iron, TV, or even socks.

So keep visiting Transcendental Stage for all new content, and check out the shop for some great gift ideas.

And Friends of Necessity
A new short story. (Which isn't really Halloween themed, but I finally got it done, so it made sense to upload it now. However, I do have a Halloween story planned for later in the month, so hopefully I'll get that done in time, or I may have to be like The Simpsons and release my Halloween stuff in November.)

Halloween always inspires me, so I still have a few more things planned for this month. Although, I always have more ideas than time, but I'll try to do my best to get it all out there so you good people can enjoy some wonderful Halloween goodness.